President Obama has won the peace prize, but nobody thinks he deserves the Nobel in economics. Despite $800 billion of economic stimulus and the accumulation of a $1.4 trillion deficit, he has been unable to lower the unemployment rate below 9.8%.
So why, after nine months of Obama, do voters, in the latest Rasmussen poll, still blame Bush - and not Obama - for the economic situation by 55-37? How can Obama skate by without having to account for the failure of his economic program?
Liberalism, particularly in economics, is usually protected by a bodyguard of pessimism. When government intervention and spending fails to yield the predicted results, month after month and year after year, the left sells the notion that these are tough times and that we need to lower our expectations.
In the late 70s, for example, the mantra that “less is more” gripped policy makers. America was in late middle age and facing its decline, inevitable (and even healthy), we were told, after its artificial post-World War II dominance.
Then came Reagan who showed us all how unrealistic were these diminished expectations and how they could be put to shame if the private sector were truly unleashed. Margaret Thatcher taught the same lesson to British pessimists, clucking at the decline in their island’s fortunes.
In the early and mid nineties, austerity was the order of the day as President Clinton and Speaker Gingrich vied with one another to eliminate the deficit by cutting spending. But when Clinton and Newt slashed the capital gains tax instead the economy soared and the deficit - once ticketed for eradication in seven years - dissolved in eighteen months.
Now Obama is succeeding in convincing us that we are entering an era of scarcity and that prosperity will remain a distant goal as we wrestle to the high unemployment that is inevitable in these tough times. The more his economic policies doom us to continued high unemployment, which inhibits the consumer spending that could cure it, the more he will peddle the mantra that joblessness is inevitable.
How long will Obama be able to get away with this shell game? For how many more months will succeed in shucking off the blame for his failed policies onto Bush?
Unfortunately, it looks like he can do so for as long as the current economic situation continues!
But the key word here is “current.” He will probably be able to escape the rap for unemployment and slow or no growth. But when the deficits he introduced trigger inflation and then stag-flation, all bets will be off.
The collapse of the dollar and the continuation of high deficits and seemingly endless issuance of new money by the Fed, make inflation very likely in the opinion of most economists. This new disease will clearly not be from the hangover of the Bush Administration, but will be Obama’s fault in the eyes of the public. Inflation will be uniquely his and his alone. He won’t be able to pretend that it was inherited from Bush. He will get his fair share of the blame, for once.
And it will probably arrive just in time to make itself felt in the Congressional elections of next year.
 |
Comments
Only subscribers to Dick Morris' '08 Play-By-Play may post comments. You must be logged in to post a comment.
I don’t know that he’ll get any blame, the MSM can’t let him fail. Like Frankenstein’s monster, they gave him life and now we the villagers will have to take care of him. We’ll take our pitchforks and torches to the ballot box in 2010 & 2012, ending the monster’s reign of terror.
We just have to keep fighting to keep people informed(and all must do their part whether it’s making donations or writing articles or speaking up when previously we would be silent). The truth can set America free. It is going to be difficult(with the media’s continued fawning over Obama and deliberate attempts to hide the truth) to keep people informed but we must keep fighting. Washington did not give up despite difficulties at Valley Forge and losses of many battles to the British. We must not give up also and we must continue to fight and fight hard against this false prophet, liar and sophist who is now our President. Vote the Democratic Congress out in 2010!!! Vote the false prophet Obama out in 2012!!! Get every conservative you can registered to vote and prepared to vote in 2010 and 2012!!! Dick, keep up the fight. You are doing yeoman’s work in combating Obama’s socialism. You are an inspiration.
[…] Pessimism: Obama’s Political Ally […]
[…] BUMP: Now that Obama’s poll numbers are creeping up again, twisted Republican “toe-suckers” like Dick Morris will always find something …..to throw at […]
[…] (more…) […]
Dick Morris has a special gift of not trying to explain just the events of the day, but rather how it fits into the long term picture for major issues facing this country. These analyses are done in way that transcends the boring statistics and facts that allows people to listen, digest, and understand the information and go forward with confidence to enter into meaningful discussions and correspondence.
Ronald Reagan in 1961 said that one of the easiest ways to creep socialism into the country would be through health care because it has the advantage of seemingly being humane in concept.
My wife, who is a college instructor, tends to lean left and with myself being a conservative can and has lead to some interesting discussions. She always clobbers (not literally!) me over the head about ‘for the collective good stuff’. As a former political couch potato I have read, joined the Heritage Foundation, Dick Morris’ site and subscribe to several newsletters. After much reading it dawned on me a good retort to ‘the collective good comment’ was, ‘ok if you truly believe that, then if a student in your class makes a 90 and another student makes a 70; you should take 10 points from the 90 student and give to the 70 student, making both have an 80 and no one fails’. So far that argument has held firm. This example can also apply to retribution of wealth.
I believe our Constitution was based more on the individual then the whole. The 2010 and 2012 elections will be where each individual vote will count because in all probability the big liberal states (e.g., NY, CA) are probably going to vote for Obama regardless of the situation. Only if we can make (couch potatoes like myself) become active and vote can these extremists be voted out.
[…] Oliver E. Williamson Homepage at University of California, Berkeley Telephone interview with Oliver E. Williamson recorded immediately following the announcement of The 2009 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, 12 October 2009. The interviewer is Adam Smith, Editor-in-Chief of Nobelprize.org. Listen to the Interview 7 min. Play Wiki: Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences Thomas Reuters: 2009 Nobel prize predictions Brookings: Nobel Prize in Economics: Illusions From Tinbergen to Keynes MarketWatch: Obama fails to win Nobel prize in economics Dick Morris And Eileen McGann: PESSIMISM: OBAMA’S POLITICAL ALLY […]
[…] PESSIMISM: OBAMA’S POLITICAL ALLY […]